I check that blog every day, especially since it drifted away from it's stated topic.

"It's hard to believe how high the standards in popular arts were just a few decades ago."

And I don't think they've dropped because of a lack of talent--I think it's more due to the opposing forces of "the cult of the artist," and the lack of art directors/editors/movie and TV producers who don't know how to set and hold creative people to standards.

I'm so glad you found this blog! I stumbled upon it a ways back after seeing a link to some of those great, pulp covers and then ended up loving it more just because it covers so many different other styles that I like.

What do you think of the illustrations in Dickens? Instead of drawing the people in a "realistic" manner, the characters appear as sketches and for me are quite appealing.For example, it can be seen the illustrator had fun with Fagin.

this type of work is what i DID NOT SEE on display at the school of visual arts.i did see this type of work at the SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS, take the kids out of class at the school of visual arts, walk them down to the society of illustrators, then, for homework,make them copy everything they see posted on your blog.solution!

This beautiful illustrations is something i see nowhere in today's society. And John A is right, softwares like Photoshop (Tough i use more for the colouring) and Paint Tool SAI morphed peoples to anarchic imitations of good illustrations and cartoonings nowadays.

BTW, JK and others, did you know the video game industry still expects submissions of __storyboards__ for game title proposals? That's right folks, game companies are not interested in illustrated radio like network/cable TV - they require honest to gawd illustrations (MS in particular)!

JK, you might seriously look into that arena as games with story (such as the recently released and successful psycho thriller "Alan Wake") are growing in popularity. The cut scenes or story setup scenes can sometimes last several minutes! Also, some consoles such as MS's Kinect (formerly project Natal) will recognize body/face language - imagine George Liquor or Ren/Stimpy being able to respond to a player's smile/smirk/gesture, etc?

Shucks John. I honestly think incorporating subject matter is a great way to encourage people to get better at drawing and animation in general. Not that I'm a master drawer by any means, but I am a teacher, and I have been recently been teaching my preschool class about stop motion animation. They are 4 years old. Four. Not even old enough to read yet. And how did I get them to understand how animation works? By asking them what they are into and making a stop motion cartoon about that subject. It happened that they were really into Star Wars, so I had them make "Star Wars ships" out of legos and move them around frame by frame while I took digital pictures. Not only did this teach them about how animation works, but it also taught them to be passionate about animation. Passion. Something we can both agree is lacking in cartoons today.

Drew Friedman's comic shop clerks are freakin' fantastic. I had my Drew books stolen some time ago and Drew's brother Josh gave me copies of first editions, what a mensch! Drew is so amazing as an illustrator it's both funny and deadly, this is the guy Robert Crumb is in awe of.

Speaking of high standards. Saw this today and wondered how well the artist did based on your critique.http://ugliesttattoos.com/2010/07/01/funny-tattoos-space-madness/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+UgliestTattoos+%28Ugliest+Tattoos%29